AutoBlog

Freightliner goes all
Gymkhana drifty on us,
finishes with big jump

March 21, 2014 —So, it's a safe bet that the following video is the craziest thing you'll see all day. Maybe this week, and quite possibly, this month. It stars, in no particular order, a drifting Freightliner semi driven by Pikes Peak champ Mike Ryan, a dock worker/stuntman being pulled behind said semi, a Ford Crown Victoria driving on two wheels, a drifting Nissan 240SX Coupe, two ramps, a row of Smart Fortwo minicarsand the Long Beach harbor. Yes, this is the sequel to the original "Size Matters."

Jalopnik

Race-Tuned Freightliner
Truck Raises Tire Smokin'
Hell At The Docks
March 21, 2014 — Ever watched the Gymkhana videos and thought sure, that's fun, but that car's too damn small, and where are all the guys getting dragged along behind it, or the Crown Vics on two wheels?

If that's the case, then Mike Ryan's Freightliner Gymkhana means you are very much in luck.

Video:

About the build
June 29, 2013 —This video goes deep inside the totally unique racing project with clear explanations on what Mike Ryan and Gale Banks set out to do—and how they planned to do it.

Driver Mike Ryan

Earlier work

Video:

SIZE MATTERS
Mar 31, 2011— Drifting a high horsepower 3,000 pound sports car… easy. Try it in a 10,000 pound purpose built Semi Truck… not so easy.
Racer / Stunt Man Mike Ryan has driven this truck to 12 Pikes Peak Hill Climb Championships and decided it's time to show his skills and the capabilities of his race truck on the original Gymkhana location at El Toro Marine Base in CA ala Ken Block. Watch as Mike pushes his drift truck to the limits.
This film is a BANDITO BROTHERS PRODUCTION…

Become a Banks Insider!

Stay up to date with the Pikes Peak project, as well as other inside information with Gale's Insider
Newsletter.

Click here to get "Gale's Insider News
& Deals" delivered straight to your inbox so you won't have to worry about missing any events or special
offers!

Size Matters 2

“Wherever we go with the Freightliner, it’s an unusual, almost surreal experience. The whole thing is unnatural from its very foundation. You take a five-ton big rig, it’s got a Detroit Diesel engine that we turbocharged and supercharged, added our Straight-Shot methanol injection, then added a three-headed beast we call Ram-Air, and then you do things with it that most people wouldn’t do even in a regular car. Up at Pikes Peak last year, we had crazy weather trying to kill Mike Ryan, the driver, but that didn’t keep him from pushing the truck hard and taking it, literally, to the edge.

When we rented the Matson shipping lines at the port of Long Beach for this video, we had bad weather again, plus, between homeland security and the insurance company, we almost didn’t get to do the jump.

I think anyone who’s into trucks, drifting, jumping and insane stunts will dig it. As far as what’s next for the truck, we’re doing some tweaks to get ready for the next Pikes Peak hill climb on June 29th, and who knows, if this video takes off we’ll have to figure out how to top it for Size Matters 3. Whatever we do, I guarantee it will be something you’ve never seen before.”

— Gale Banks

Size Matters 2: Behind the scenes

March 11, 2014

Check out some behind the scenes footage from the next video for the Freightliner. We'll be launching the final cut of "Size Matters 2" on March 21st. So keep an eye out!

Filming begins

February 10, 2014

Mike Ryan took the Freightliner out for some film action. The truck ran great after some upgrades were done. We tuned the Super-Turbo and the truck ran like a champ. Can't wait to see the final edit!

It has been a spectacular last week or so shooting our next truck drifting video with Director Bailey Kobe, DP Michael Fitzmaurice and Dean Bailey owner of Performance Filmworks driving one of his new Mercedes ML 63 AMG Edge Crane camera cars. Terry James coordinated the stunts for me and Wally Crowder even drove down from Camarillo to Long Beach to help out. James Smith did an amazing job of skiing a 377,000 mile Crown Victoria and Danial Leavitt, son of Lane Leavitt and Stunt Lady Debbie Evans did an awesome job drifting his V8 240SX. We have a few more scenes to shoot this week and we plan to release it on YouTube in March. Gotta say that Size Matters 2 is much larger production than Size Matters 1 was and it is filled with a lot of surprises. So far, Size Matters 1 has earned over 1.8 million hits on YouTube and it is still growing. Size Matters
on YouTube

Brand new skin

February 4, 2014

With a new season comes a new look. We want to welcome Castrol Oil and Triumph Motorcycles to the team. This year is looking extremely promising. After our run last year, the team has tuned and improved the Banks Super-Turbo and StraightShot methanol injection system. The truck is running better than it ever has, and this time we are taking home the trophy! To keep up to date on how the project is going, you can follow us here, on our Facebook page or on Twitter as we share how Mike Ryan and his bad ass Banks Power Super-Turbo Freightliner are doing.

A look back at Banks and Pikes Peak

Want to know more about Banks Power and Pikes Peak? Check out the links below to read about previous years on the mountain.